The Characters  The Gods Read TLT
by vampire13eb
Summary: The PJO and HoO characters read the boks with the gods! They will be reading, but reading the books won't be the excact focus point of this story. Please read.   ON HOLD
1. Huh?

**I own nothing except Rylee O'Connor. **

The Gods and Goddesses of Mount Olympus sat in the throne room on the Winter Solstice. Hades was there, and they were all sitting on their thrones, bickering.

"Mother Rhea always liked you best!"

"Sea disasters are more spectacular than sky disasters!"

In the midst of this, there was a flash. A note written in Ancient Greek appeared and Athena caught in as it fell from the ceiling.

"Silence!" Athena yelled. A silence fell.

"What did you find, Lady Athena?" Zeus asked, grumbling.

"A note. It says:"

"_Dear Gods and Goddesses of Mount Olympus (That includes you, Hades), _

_I have taken the liberty of sending you this note to tell you that on precisely 12:00 pm on the day after you read this, these demigods, from Camp Half-Blood and Camp Jupiter both, will be coming to read this booklist. These demigods are from the future, as well as these books_," Athena read the demigod list

"_Thalia Grace, Jason Grace, Nico di Angelo, Leo Valdez, Rachel Elizabeth Dare, Percy Jackson, Piper McLean, Annabeth Chase, Travis and Connor Stoll, Clarisse La Roux, Frank Zhang, Hazel Levesque, Reyna Praetor of Rome, Grover Underwood, and Rylee O'Connor. Some of the demigods are from different time periods_," Then she Read the Booklist

"_Percy Jackson The Lightning Thief, Percy Jackson and The Sea of Monsters, Percy Jackson and The Titan's Curse, Percy Jackson and The Battle of The Labyrinth, Percy Jackson and The Last Olympian, The Lost Hero, The Son of Neptune, and then they'll be a book called 'Percy Jackson: The Ultimate Guide_.'" Athena looked up.

"Shall we allow this to happen?" she asked Zeus.

"It will allow us to see how things go by in the future. Yes, we will allow this to happen." Zeus commanded.

*The next day around noon*

All the Gods and Goddesses were in the throne room, waiting for 12:00. The clock chimed 12, and there were 16 different flashes of coloured light. 16 people were spread out on the floor. Most of them stood up immediately, drawing weapons.

"Why are we here?" A girl with honey blond hair asked.

"Why don't you introduce yourselves first, then we'll explain the situation? And please state your name, parents, title, and age." Zeus offered.

A girl with black hair stepped forwards

"I am Reyna, Daughter of Bellona and Praetor of The Twelfth Legion. I am 17."

A boy with cropped black hair, and a baby-ish face said "I'm Frank Zhang, son of Mars and Emily Zhang. I'm 15." **(A/N I'm not sure how old Frank is. I just decided he should be the same age as Percy. Or, at least, around the same age as Percy)**

A girl with hazel eyes and brown hair said

"I'm Hazel Levesque, daughter of Pluto and Marie Levesque. Rider of Arion. I'm 15." **(A/N See above↑. Same as Frank)** She stepped back. A boy with blond hair stepped forwards

"I'm Jason Grace, son of Jupiter and brother of Thalia Grace. Former Praetor of the Twelfth Legion. I'm 14." Hazel, Frank, and Reyna's eyes widened.

A girl with black hair, blue eyes and a silver circlet around her head said

"I'm Thalia Grace, daughter of Zeus, sister of Jason Grace, and lieutenant to Artemis. I'm 15."

A boy with shaggy black hair and a black aviator's jacket stepped forwards

"Nico di Angelo, son of Hades and Maria di Angelo. I'm the Ambassador of Pluto -" he glanced timidly at his friends "And I'm the Ghost King. I'm 16. From 2013" **(He's from 3 years after the Second Titan War, and a year after the Roman-Greek thing with the Giants)**

Before anyone could get mad at Nico, a boy with black hair and an elfish face said

"I'm Leo Valdez, son of Hephaestus and Esperanza Valdez. I'm 14." A girl with brown hair and multi-coloured eyes says

"I'm Piper McLean, daughter of Aphrodite and Tristan McLean. I'm 14." A boy with black hair and green eyes stepped up.

"I'm Percy Jackson, son of – well, I'm not sure which it is, Neptune or Poseidon – and Sally Jackson. Hero of Olympus and Praetor of the Twelfth Legion. I'm 16." A girl with blond hair and grey eyes stepped up, staring at Percy, while saying.

"I'm Annabeth Chase, daughter of Athena and Fredrick Chase, Architect of Olympus. I'm also 16." Percy was staring at her. She smiled at him as a girl with straggly brown hair stepped up.

"I'm Clarisse La Roux, daughter of Ares, Drakon Slayer. I'm 17." Ares looked impressed. Two boys stepped up.

"We're Travis and Connor Stoll. Sons of Hermes. We're 17 and 16." They stepped back. A girl with frizzy red hair stepped up.

"I'm Rachel Elizabeth Dare, Oracle of Delphi. 16." A boy with curly brown hair and a Rasta cap said

"I'm Grover Underwood, Member of The Council of Cloven Elders, and Lord of the Wild. I'm 32."

The last girl, nobody seemed to recognize. She had dark brown hair, grey-green eyes, and pale skin. She stepped up.

"I'm Rylee O'Connor. Undetermined daughter of fill in the blank and Amelia O'Connor."

"But there aren't supposed to be any more undetermined campers!" Annabeth said.

"The gods are busy, Annabeth. "They don't always have time for all of their children," Rylee said warily.

"But -" Annabeth protested

"I'm fine with it."

"No really, we could figure it out. Please?" She turned to the gods.

"Annabeth," Rylee spoke determinedly.

"I know who my father is. He just hasn't claimed me. I'm 16. From 2013." She said, almost sadly, the last part firmly.

Annabeth sighed and turned to the gods and goddesses.

"So we're here because...?" she asked, not rudely, but curiously.

"Because we were sent a note saying that you would be brought here to change our future – you're past."

"How?" Rylee asked.

"By reading these books; Athena?" Athena repeated the book list.

"Great. An Ultimate Guide about me," Percy grumbled.

"We will begin reading now," Zeus declared as two books appeared. It was the Guide and The Lightning Thief.

"I'll read first, shall I?" Rylee asked.

She got the book, and opened it to the correct page.

"Table of Contents:" She read the titles silently to herself, and got a really weird look on her face, before turning the page.

"**I Accidentally Vaporise My Pre-algebra Teacher**."


	2. Never Too Late

Rylee's POV:

"Wait," Annabeth stopped me before I could start reading.

"Yeah?" I asked, putting the book down, with its corner dog-eared.

"Who's your godly parent? It's going to eat at me until it's revealed." Annabeth stated.

"It's not going to be in the book. I came while you guys were on your first quest, and only stayed the summer, which you guys were gone on quests. I'm 3 years younger than you, so why would you know me? It will not, guaranteed, be in the book." I said.

"The guide! We can check the guide!" Annabeth said, seemingly victorious. She snatched up the guide and scanned through it.

"This is quite interesting. Oh, really Percy?" she asked, rolling her eyes. Then she put the book down.

"Nothing." She said in dismay.

"I'm sure a few of my brothers are in there," I said, thinking of my siblings who'd died in the wars. I bowed my head, before quickly blinking back tears. I took a deep, shuddering breath, and felt a hand on my arm. I looked up, and saw Nico. His touch comforted me.

"Thanks, Nic," I said, smiling gratefully.

"No problem, Ry," he replied, before taking his hand back.

"I'm sorry. It's just, a lot of my siblings died in the Second Titan War, and the Giant War." I explained to the other demigods. They all nodded their heads, despite them not knowing what the Giant war was yet, considering it was half a year away from their time period.

"What's your favourite animal?" Annabeth fired off.

"A horse, closely followed by a cat. Why? Are we playing 20 questions?" I asked sarcastically. Annabeth glanced at Percy.

"Nope," I replied to her unasked question.

"What?" she asked.

"Poseidon's not my dad." I said.

"Oh," her eyebrows furrowed.

"Ya know, it doesn't matter. I know my father, and I know he knows who I am." I shot a glance at the Gods' side of the room.

"Do you have any hobbies?" Annabeth asked.

"Still playin' 20 questions, eh? Well, I like riding, and climbing the Climbing Wall, and shooting things." I answered truthfully.

"Shooting?" Percy asked.

"Yup," I said, popping the 'P.'

"Come on, Ry. You're just gonna make them confused," Nico said. "It's gonna be annoying. There gonna be annoying."

"Its gonna be fun," I corrected. I saw the glint in his eye. He was still set on his plan.

"What do you wanna be if you grow up?" Annabeth asked. The Gods/Goddesses winced at the natural usage of 'if.'

"An artist," I answered.

"What kind of artist?" she fired.

"Now, I can't answer that. That'd give it away immediately." I scoffed.

"Why don't you sing a song for us?" Annabeth asked me, realization on her face.

"What makes you think I can sing?" I asked. If I did, my dad would probably claim me, but I didn't want them knowing who he was; considering I was a Seer. **(A/N: There aren't actually Seers, but it's a special ability of a certain child of a certain Sun god)** As a Seer, it meant I could see mine and my loved ones futures. It would look as if I fainted, and I saw the future. Kinda like dreams, but I can't control them. I can't manipulate my future, just observe. If I was screaming in the vision, then if anyone was with me when I 'fainted,' would hear me screaming.

"Let's just see if you can sing, Rylee." She turned to my dad, the Great God Apollo.

"Lord Apollo, being the God of music, what song would you recommend for Rylee?" Annabeth asked.

Dad looked thoughtful.

"How about Rylee chooses a song for herself?" Dad suggested.

I nodded and got thinking. It was a light bulb moment. I smiled.

Annabeth turned to the gods.

"Is it okay, if Rylee sings a song?" I guess they wanted to know my Olympian parent as much as Annabeth did, because they all agreed. My dad gave me a look saying 'you'll be fine.' I sighed half-heartedly, and stood in front of everyone.

"Um, hi. I haven't exactly preformed in front of anyone before, so I'm a bit nervous. Just saying. I'll be singing – by force – a song I like to think of as a classic, by 3 Days Grace." Then dad stood up.

"Rylee, you will be able to hear the singer in the song. You know what I mean? But we will only hear you. This is partially for timing, partially so you won't feel alone up there." Dad explained, and I nodded.

"Thanks D -... Apollo, sir," I almost called him dad.

I heard faint music playing as they started to sing. I started as well.

**(A/N Bold is Never Too Late, italics is her thoughts/what's going on)**

**This world will never be what I expected.**

_I glanced around me, at Olympus. It looks better after Annabeth re-designed it._

**And if I don't belong, who would've guessed it?**

_I shrugged, half smiling around the words. I didn't belong, and I was damn proud of it._

**I will not leave alone, everything that I own, to make you feel like it's not too late; it's never too late!**

_I was looking at Nico. He was ready to give up in the Giant War. I just knew it. He'd told me he'd rather kill himself than fight a losing war, which hurt me. His expression showed me that he understood what I meant._

**Even if I say "It'll be all right." Still I hear you say you want to end your life. Now and again we try to just stay alive. Maybe we'll turn it all around, cuz it's not too late, it's never too late!**

_I stared determinedly at Nico as I sang this. He stared back, a blank expression on his face._

**No one will ever see, this side reflected**

_Now this, was analogy - of sorts. No one's ever seen the side of me Nico knew. _

**And if there's something wrong, who would've guessed it?**

_It was true. With all the casualties now-a-days (2013) people would've been surprised if something was right._

**And I have left alone, everything that I own**

_I lost everything to this war. My mother. My brothers. I was not going to lose Nico. That's for damn sure._

**To make you feel like it's not too late, it's never too late!**

_I was almost shaking. This song expressed everything I've kept bottled up since Nico told me what he had._

**Even if I say "It'll be all right." Still I hear you say you want to end your life**

_I was actually disgusted by this. I was fighting to keep him alive, when he didn't want to be. It made me sick. Because a few things got out of hand, he was quitting on me? I am not accepting this!_

**Now and again we try, to just stay alive**

_This couldn't be truer for the demigods._

**Maybe we'll turn it all around, cuz it's not too late! It's never too late!**

_Nico shifted in his seat. Ha. Good, he was crumbling._

**The world we knew won't come back!**

_That was right, and he knew it._

**The time we've lost can't get back!**

_Yeah, and we'd lost a lot of time on trying to find Percy. Even with the Romans' help, it's been hard._

**The life we had won't be ours again!**

_This line made me sad. I liked our life. If he killed himself, how could it be 'ours'?_

**This world will never be, what I expected, and if I don't belong...**

_I almost sighed. Don't ask why._

**Even if I say "It'll be all right." Still I hear you say you want to end your life.**

_Singing this was hard, since my teeth were clenched. I knew I was off-key, but I didn't care._

**Now and again we try, to just stay alive, maybe we'll turn it all around, cuz it's not too late, it's never too late!**

_Please, please believe me, Nic, I believe in you._

**Maybe we'll turn it all around, cuz it's not too late! It's never too late! (It's never too late)**

_It's really not. _

**It's not too late! It's never too late! **

It was over. Everyone was staring at me. I didn't care if I got claimed any more. Nico was looking guilty. It serves him right. We were best friends, and he'd asked me to kill him! Not going to happen. I just hoped he didn't go through with his plan.

I quickly went and sat down, burrowing my head in my arms. I felt them all staring approximately a foot above my head. I groaned and looked up. I saw a shimmering golden lyre. I groaned again.

"I guess the cat's out of the bag." I sighed. I turned to Apollo.

"Hi dad. Glad you finally claimed me, _after_ Percy made the deal with the gods, _and_ after 8 years," My sarcasm was evident.

"You're a good singer," Annabeth complemented me.

"Thanks, I like how you re-designed Olympus, Y'know, in your time," I whispered the last part. I picked up the book and opened it.


	3. I Accidentally Vaporise My PreAlgebra

Rylee's POV:

I opened the book to the first page.

"**I Accidentally Vaporise My Pre-Algebra Teacher**." I read, before looking up curiously.

"Hopefully you get your memory back soon, Perce, so you can explain the wacko tittles." I said, before continuing.

**Look I didn't want to be a half blood.**

I stopped reading, and looked up. "I completely agree. But hey, having awesome demigod skeelz (skills) has its perks." I continued before anyone could yell at me.

**If you're reading this because you think you might be one: close this book right now. Believe whatever lie your mom or dad has told you about your birth and try to lead a normal life. Being a half blood is dangerous.**

"No dip Sherlock," Connor said.

**It's scary.**

"Unfortunate, but true." Travis said.

**Most of the time it gets you killed in painful nasty ways.**

"Also unfortunate." I bowed my head, remembering the dead.

**If you're a normal kid reading it because you think its fiction, great. Read on. I envy you for being able to believe none of this ever happened. But if you recognize yourself in these pages - if you feel something stirring inside-stop reading immediately.**

I closed the book, and put it on the table. Everyone looked at me.

"That can't be the end of the chapter." Annabeth said.

"No, but it said to stop reading," I explained. Annabeth looked shocked. I smirked before continuing.

**You might be one of us. And once you know that, it's only a matter of time before **_**they**_** sense it to, and they'll come for you. Don't say I didn't warn you. **

"You didn't warn me." Leo said, smiling a wicked smile.

**My name is Percy Jackson.**

"No it's his name," Travis said, pointing towards Percy. I stuck my tongue out at him.

**I'm twelve years old until a few months ago, I was a boarding student at Yancy Academy, a private school for troubled kids in upstate New York. Am I a troubled kid?**

"Yes." Thalia, Annabeth, Nico, Travis, Connor, Clarisse, Rachel, Grover and I all chorused. Percy just looked confused. I sighed. 

**Yeah you could say that. **

**I could start at any point in my short miserable life to prove it, but things really started going bad last May when our class took a field trip to the Metropolitan Museum of art to look at ancient Greek and Roman stuff.**

I stopped and shuddered. "Sounds ghastly."

**I know- it sounds like torture.**

I grinned.

**But Mr. Brunner, our Latin teacher, was leading this trip, so I had hopes he had thinning hair and a scruffy beard and a frayed tweed jacket, which always smelled like coffee.**

"Chiron!" The Camp Half-Blooders cheered.

"Who is Chiron?" Reyna asked.

"Our trainer." I said, "You'll see."

**You wouldn't think he he'd be cool, but he told stories and jokes and let us play games in class. He also had this awesome collection of Roman armour and weapons, so he was the only teacher whose class didn't put me to sleep. I hoped the trip would be okay. At least, I hoped for once I wouldn't get in trouble. Boy was I wrong.**

"As usual." Thalia muttered, smiling fondly.

**See, bad things happen to me on field trips. Like at my fifth- grade school , when we went to the Saratoga battle field , I had this accident with a Revolutionary War cannon, I wasn't aiming for the school bus, but of course I got expelled anyway.**

"Sweet!" Leo and I both cried.

**And before that at my fourth-grade school, when we took a behind-the-scenes tour of the marine world shark pool, I short of hit the wrong lever on the catwalk and our class took an upland swim.**

**And the time before that… Well you get the idea.**

"No I don't," Connor said.

**This trip I was determined to be good. All the way into the city, I put up with Nancy Bobofit, the freckly redheaded kleptomaniac girl hitting my best friend Grover** **with chunks of peanut butter-and-ketchup sandwich.**

"We're best friends?"Percy asked. Grover nodded.

"Yeah, you, me, and Annabeth. Well, Annabeth's a little more than your best friend, but yeah." Annabeth blushed. 

**Grover was an easy target. He was scrawny. He cried when he got frustrated. He must've been held back a few grades because he was the only sixth grader with acne and a wispy beard on his chin. On top of all that he, was crippled. He had a note excusing him from PE for the rest of his life**

"Lucky goat," I muttered.

**because he had some kind of muscular disease in his legs. He walked funny, like every step hurt him, but don't let that fool you. You should've seen him run when it was enchilada day in the cafeteria.**

We laughed.

**Anyway Nancy ****B****obofit was throwing wads of sandwich that stuck in his curly brown hair, and she knew I couldn't do anything back to her because I was already on probation. The headmaster had threatened me with death by in-school suspension if anything bad, embarrassing, or even mildly entertaining happened on this field trip. **

"**I'm going to kill her," I mumbled.**

"Do it!" Ares yelled.

**Grover tried to calm me down. "It's okay. I like peanut butter." He dodged another piece of Nancy's lunch. "That's it." I started to get up, but Grover pulled me back to my seat.**

"**You're already on probation," he reminded me "you know who'll get blamed if anything happens**." **Looking back on it I wish id deck Nancy Bobofit right then and there.**

"You should have," Clarisse mumbled.

**In-school suspension would've been nothing compared to the mess I was about to get myself in to.**

"Hellz yeah,"I interrupted myself**. **

**Mr. Brunner led the museum tour. He rode up in his wheelchair, guiding us though big echoey galleries, past marble statues and glass cases full of really old black and orange pottery. It blew my mind that this stuff had survived for thousands of years**.

"We survived much longer than that, boy," Zeus said.

**He gathered us around a thirteen-foot-tall stone column with a big sphinx on top, a **_**stele**_**, for a girl about our age. He told us about the carvings on the sides. I was trying to listen to what he had to say, because it was kind of interesting but everybody around me was talking, and every time I told I told them to shut up, the other teacher chaperon, Mrs. Dodds, would give me the evil eye. Mrs. Dodds was this little math teacher from Georgia who always wore a black leather jacket, even though she was fifty years old. She looked mean enough to ride a Harley right in to your locker. She had come to Yancy halfway through the year when the last math teacher had a nervous breakdown. From her first day, Mrs. Dodds loved Nancy and figured I was devil spawn. She would point her crooked finger and say, Now honey, real sweet and I knew I was going to get after-school detention for a month. One time, after she'd made me erase answers out of old math workbooks until midnight, I told Grover I didn't think Mrs. Dodds was human. He looked at me, and said, "You're absolutely right."**

Nico and I stared at Hades. I knew _exactly_ who he'd sent after Percy, and I _hated_ her. Hades shifted guiltily.

**Mr. Brunner kept talking about Greek funeral art. Finally Nancy Bobofit snickered something about the naked guy on the stele, and I turned around and said, "Will you **_**shut up?"**_** it came out louder then I meant it to. The whole group laughed. Mr. Brunner stopped his story. "Mr. Jackson he said did you have a comment?" My face was totally red. I said, no sir. Mr. Brunner pointed "Perhaps you'll tell us what this picture represents?"**

"Will Percy recognize it?" Hermes asked in a commentator's voice.

**I looked at the carving, and felt a flush of relief, because I actually recognized it. "That's Kronos eating his kids, right?"**

The gods who'd been eaten shivered.

"**Yes," Mr. Brunner said, obviously not satisfied.**

**"And he **_**did **_**this because ..."**

**"Well..." I racked my brain to remember. "Kronos was the king god,** **and—"**

"God? You'd better learn the difference quick, boy, before you're incinerated." Mr. D looked up from his wine magazine.

"Of course he learns the difference! How else could he have – mmmff mmFFFFFF!" Nico put his hand over my mouth.

"Don't wreck it." He said, before sitting down again.

"**God?" Mr. Brunner asked.**

**"Titan," I corrected myself. "And ... he didn't trust his kids, who were the gods. So, um, Kronos ate them, right? But his wife hid baby Zeus, and gave Kronos a rock to eat instead.** **And later, when Zeus grew up, he tricked his dad, Kronos, into barfing up his brothers and sisters—"**

**"Eeew!" said one of the girls behind me.**

"I agree," Aphrodite said, wrinkling her nose.

**"—and so there was this big fight between the gods and the Titans," I continued, "and the gods won."**

"Of course we did. We're flippin' amazing!" Dad bragged.

**Some snickers from the group.**

**Behind me, Nancy Bobofit mumbled to a friend, "Like we're going to use this in real life. Like it's going to say on our job applications, 'Please explain why Kronos ate his kids.'" "And why, Mr. Jackson," Brunner said, "to paraphrase Miss Bobofit's excellent question, does this matter in real life?"**

"Oh, that's easy. You just have to figure out you're a demigod, and all that becomes real,' Connor said in what he must have thought was a helpful tone.

**"Busted," Grover muttered.**

**"Shut up," Nancy hissed, her face even brighter red than her hair.**

**At least Nancy got packed, too. Mr. Brunner was the only one who ever caught her saying anything wrong. He had radar ears.**

"Or horse ears," Clarisse scowled.

**I thought about his question, and shrugged. "I don't know, sir."**

**"I see." Mr. Brunner looked disappointed. "Well, half credit, Mr. Jackson. Zeus did indeed feed Kronos a mixture of mustard and wine, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being immortal gods, had been living and growing up completely undigested in the Titan's stomach.**

"That would be one messed up childhood." I couldn't pinpoint the speaker.

**The gods defeated their father, sliced him to pieces with his own scythe, and scattered his remains in Tartarus, the darkest part of the Underworld. On that happy note, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead us back outside?"**

"On that _happy_ note?" I reread, disbelieving.

**The class drifted off, the girls holding their stomachs, the guys pushing each other around and acting like doofuses. **

**Grover and I were about to follow when Mr. Brunner said, "Mr. Jackson."**

**I knew that was coming.**

**I told Grover to keep going. Then I turned toward Mr. Brunner. "Sir?"**

**Mr. Brunner had this look that wouldn't let you go— intense brown eyes that could've been a thousand years old and had seen everything.**

"Not _everything_," Hermes said.

**"You must learn the answer to my question," Mr. Brunner told me.**

**"About the Titans?"**

**"About real life. And how your studies apply to it."**

**"Oh."**

**"What you learn from me," he said, "is vitally important. I expect you to treat it as such. I will accept only the best from you, Percy Jackson."**

"I hate it when people say that, don't you?" I sighed.

**I wanted to get angry, this guy pushed me so hard.**

**I mean, sure, it was kind of cool on tournament days, when he dressed up in a suit of Roman armour and shouted: "What ho!'" and challenged us, sword-point against chalk, to run to the board and name every Greek and Roman person who had ever **_**lived, **_**and their mother, and what god they worshiped.**

**But Mr. Brunner expected me to be as good as everybody else, despite the fact that I have dyslexia and attention deficit disorder and I had never made above a C— in my life. No—he didn't expect me to be **_**as good; **_**he expected me to be **_**better. **_

"Better doesn't always mean best." Dad said, confusing everyone.

"Exactly," I nodded.

**And I just couldn't learn all those names and facts, much less spell them correctly.**

**I mumbled something about trying harder, while Mr. Brunner took one long sad look at the stele, like he'd been at this girl's funeral.**

"He probably was." Artemis sighed.

**He told me to go outside and eat my lunch.**

**The class gathered on the front steps of the museum, where we could watch the foot traffic along Fifth Avenue.**

**Overhead, a huge storm was brewing, with clouds blacker than I'd ever seen over the city.**

Everyone looked at Zeus and Poseidon.

"HE DID IT!" They both yelled at the same time.

**I figured maybe it was global warming or something, because the weather all across New York State had been weird since Christmas.**

**We'd had massive snow storms, flooding, wildfires from lightning strikes. I wouldn't have been surprised if this was a hurricane blowing in.**

"Maybe something happened at the Winter Solstice," Athena mused.

**Nobody else seemed to notice. Some of the guys were pelting pigeons with Lunchables crackers. Nancy Bobofit was trying to pickpocket something from a lady's purse, and, of course, Mrs. Dodds wasn't seeing a thing.**

"Of _course_," I said scathingly.

**Grover and I sat on the edge of the fountain, away from the others. We thought that maybe if we did that, everybody wouldn't know we were from **_**that **_**school—the school for loser freaks who couldn't make it elsewhere.**

"That failed, now that I think about it,"

**"Detention?" Grover asked.**

**"Nah," I said. "Not from Brunner. I just wish he'd lay off me sometimes. I mean—I'm not a genius."**

"Ain't that the truth," Thalia joked.

**Grover didn't say anything for a while. Then, when I thought he was going to give me some deep philosophical comment to make me feel better, he said, "Can I have your apple?"**

"Sorry, Perce." Grover apologized.

**I didn't have much of an appetite, so I let him take it.**

**I watched the stream of cabs going down Fifth Avenue, and thought about my mom's apartment, only a little ways uptown from where we sat. I hadn't seen her since Christmas. I wanted so bad to jump in a taxi and head home. **

**She'd hug me and be glad to see me, but she'd be disappointed, too. She'd send me right back to Yancy**, **remind me that I had to try harder, even if this was my sixth school in six years and I was probably going to be kicked out again. I wouldn't be able to stand that sad look she'd give me.**

"Momma's boy," Ares said.

**Mr. Brunner parked his wheelchair at the base of the handicapped ramp. He ate celery while he read a paperback novel. A red umbrella stuck up from the back of his chair, making it look like a motorized cafe table.**

**I was about to unwrap my sandwich when Nancy Bobofit appeared in front of me with her ugly friends—I guess she'd gotten tired of stealing from the tourists—and dumped her half-eaten lunch in Grover's lap. **

"I Do not like her," almost everyone said.

**"Oops." She grinned at me with her crooked teeth. Her freckles were orange, as if somebody had spray-painted her face with liquid Cheetos.**

"Attractive," Aphrodite gagged.

**I tried to stay cool. The school counsellor had told me a million times, "Count to ten, get control of your temper." But I was so mad my mind went blank. A wave roared in my ears.**

**I don't remember touching her, but the next thing I knew, Nancy was sitting on her butt in the fountain, screaming, "Percy pushed me!"**

**Mrs. Dodds materialized next to us.**

**Some of the kids were whispering: "Did you see—"**

**"—the water—"**

**"—like it grabbed her—"**

"That's actually a cool trick," I commented.

"Uhh, thanks?" Percy said nervously.

**I didn't know what they were talking about. All I knew was that I was in trouble again.**

**As soon as Mrs. Dodds was sure poor little Nancy was okay, promising to get her a new shirt at the museum gift shop, etc., etc., Mrs. Dodds turned on me. There was a triumphant fire in her eyes, as if I'd done something she'd been waiting for all semester. "Now, honey—"**

"I hate it when she says that," Nico shuddered.

**"I know," I grumbled. "A month erasing workbooks."**

**That wasn't the right thing to say.**

"Of course it wasn't! Never guess your punishment!" Connor and Travis all but yelled.

**"Come with me," Mrs. Dodds said.**

**"Wait!" Grover yelped. "It was me. **_**I **_**pushed her."**

**I stared at him, stunned. I couldn't believe he was trying to cover for me. Mrs. Dodds scared Grover to death.**

**She glared at him so hard his whiskery chin trembled.**

**"I don't think so, Mr. Underwood," she said.**

**"But—"**

**"You—**_**will**_—**stay—here."**

"_You_ – _will _– _stay_ – _here_." I mocked.

**Grover looked at me desperately.**

**"It's okay, man," I told him. "Thanks for trying."**

**"Honey," Mrs. Dodds barked at me. "**_**Now**_**."**

**Nancy Bobofit smirked.**

**I gave her my deluxe I'll-kill-you-later stare.**

"I'm shaking in my boots," Ares gaffed.

**Then I turned to face Mrs. Dodds, but she wasn't there. She was standing at the museum entrance, way at the top of the steps, gesturing impatiently at me to come on.**

**How'd she get there so fast?**

"She's a monster, dipstick," Clarisse growled.

**I have moments like that a lot, when my brain falls asleep or something, and the next thing I know I've missed something, as if a puzzle piece fell out of the universe and left me staring at the blank place behind it. The school counsellor told me this was part of the ADHD, my brain misinterpreting things.**

**I wasn't so sure.**

**I went after Mrs. Dodds.**

**Halfway up the steps, I glanced back at Grover. He was looking pale, cutting his eyes between me and Mr. Brunner, like he wanted Mr. Brunner to notice what was going on, but Mr. Brunner was absorbed in his novel. I looked back up. Mrs. Dodds had disappeared again. She was now inside the building, at the end of the entrance hall.**

**Okay, I thought. She's going to make me buy a new shirt for Nancy at the gift shop.**

**But apparently that wasn't the plan.**

"No, cuz you just confirmed her suspicions to who you were. Now she's gunna try to kill you," Connor said. Everyone was a little shocked. **(A/N When I say everyone, I mean besides the obvious)**

**I followed her deeper into the museum. When I finally caught up to her, we were back in the Greek and Roman section.**

**Except for us, the gallery was empty.**

**Mrs. Dodds stood with her arms crossed in front of a big marble frieze of the Greek gods. She was making this weird noise in her throat, like growling.**

**Even without the noise, I would've been nervous. It's weird being alone with a teacher, especially Mrs. Dodds. Something about the way she looked at the frieze, as if she wanted to pulverize it...**

"She probably did," Hades growled.

**"You've been giving us problems, honey," she said.**

**I did the safe thing. I said, "Yes, ma'am."**

**She tugged on the cuffs of her leather jacket. "Did you really think you would get away with it?"**

"Of course not, Percy never gets away with anything," Thalia smiled.

**The look in her eyes was beyond mad. It was evil.**

**She's a teacher, I thought nervously. It's not like she's going to hurt me.**

**I said, "I'll—I'll try harder, ma'am."**

**Thunder shook the building.**

**"We are not fools, Percy Jackson," Mrs. Dodds said. "It was only a matter of time before we found you out. Confess, and you will suffer less pain."**

**I didn't know what she was talking about.**

**All I could think of was that the teachers must've found the illegal stash of candy I'd been selling out of my dorm room.**

"Of _course_ that what she meant," Athena said sarcastically.

**Or maybe they'd realized I got my essay on **_**Tom Sawyer **_**from the Internet without ever reading the book and now they were going to take away my grade. Or worse, they were going to make me read the book.**

"Oh, I _hated_ that book," I paused to say that.

**"Well?" she demanded.**

**"Ma'am, I don't..."**

**"Your time is up," she hissed.**

**Then the weirdest thing happened. Her eyes began to glow like barbecue coals. Her fingers stretched, turning into talons. Her jacket melted into large, leathery wings. She wasn't human. She was a shrivelled hag with bat wings and claws and a mouth full of yellow fangs, and she was about to slice me to ribbons.**

"You sent a Fury after my son!" Poseidon boomed.

"This is in the future, brother, peace." Zeus held up his hand.

**Then things got even stranger.**

**Mr. Brunner, who'd been out in front of the museum a minute before, wheeled his chair into the doorway of the gallery, holding a pen in his hand.**

"Anaklusmos," Poseidon sighed.

**"What ho, Percy!" he shouted, and tossed the pen through the air.**

**Mrs. Dodds lunged at me.**

**With a yelp, I dodged and felt talons slash the air next to my ear. I snatched the ballpoint pen out of the air, but when it hit my hand, it wasn't a pen anymore. It was a sword—Mr. Brunner's bronze sword, which he always used on tournament day.**

"My pen," Percy pulled out said pen.

**Mrs. Dodds spun toward me with a murderous look in her eyes.**

**My knees were jelly. My hands were shaking so bad I almost dropped the sword.**

**She snarled, "Die, honey!"**

**And she flew straight at me.**

**Absolute terror ran through my body. I did the only thing that came naturally: I swung the sword.**

"Natural to any demigod, maybe," Rachel put in.

**The metal blade hit her shoulder and passed clean through her body as if she were made of water. **_**Hisss!**_

**Mrs. Dodds was a sand castle in a power fan.**

"I love your descriptions," Leo laughed.

**She exploded into yellow powder, vaporized on the spot, leaving nothing but the smell of sulphur and a dying screech and a chill of evil in the air, as if those two glowing red eyes were still watching me.**

**I was alone.**

**There was a ballpoint pen in my hand.**

"Mist can be so annoying." Piper said sadly.

**Mr. Brunner wasn't there. Nobody was there but me.**

**My hands were still trembling. My lunch must've been contaminated with magic mushrooms or something.**

**Had I imagined the whole thing?**

"Nope," Dad said, smiling gallantly.

**I went back outside.**

**It had started to rain.**

**Grover was sitting by the fountain, a museum map tented over his head. Nancy Bobofit was still standing there, soaked from her swim in the fountain, grumbling to her ugly friends. When she saw me, she said, "I hope Mrs. Kerr whipped your butt."**

"Who?" was the general response.

**I said, "Who?"**

**"Our **_**teacher.**_ **Duh!"**

**I blinked. We had no teacher named Mrs. Kerr. I asked Nancy what she was talking about.**

**She just rolled her eyes and turned away.**

**I asked Grover where Mrs. Dodds was.**

**He said, "Who?"**

**But he paused first, and he wouldn't look at me, so I thought he was messing with me.**

"Grover's a very bad liar. Sorry Grover," I said to the satyr.

**"Not funny, man," I told him. "This is serious."**

**Thunder boomed overhead.**

**I saw Mr. Brunner sitting under his red umbrella, reading his book, as if he'd never moved.**

**I went over to him.**

**He looked up, a little distracted. "Ah, that would be my pen. Please bring your own writing utensil in the future, Mr. Jackson."**

"See, Chiron can lie," I said, gesturing to the book.

**I handed Mr. Brunner his pen. I hadn't even realized I was still holding it.**

**"Sir," I said, "where's Mrs. Dodds?"**

**He stared at me blankly. "Who?"**

**"The other chaperone. Mrs. Dodds. The pre-algebra teacher."**

**He frowned and sat forward, looking mildly concerned. "Percy, there is no Mrs. Dodds on this trip. As far as I know, there has never been a Mrs. Dodds at Yancy Academy. Are you feeling all right?"**

"Of course he's not. He's hallucinating about demon math teachers!" Leo wailed in fake misery.

"That's the end of the chapter."

I set the book down.

"Can a talk to you alone for a minute?" he asked, then turned to everyone else.

"If that's alright?" They nodded, and I followed him out the door and through the city.


	4. AN

**Ok, I'm sorry this is an Author's Note, and I don't want to say this to be harsh, because all of my reviewers are amazing and super helpful. **

**I've had some reviews telling me that Nico is supposed to be 13 -14. I **_**know**_** that. But the way I pictured this story, it's that he's from 3 years after TLO (The Last Olympian), therefore he would be 16, Percy/Annabeth would be 19, and so forth.**

**Again, I don't mean to be rude/offend people, so please don't take this the wrong way, if you read this: 'Ice'? You're right, I am putting two different stories into one, but, as I clearly said on the summary: reading the books isn't the main focus point to this story. I know it's confusing, but I wanted it to be this way. **

**So I'll say this now: for this story constructive criticism is expected, pointing out mistake I'm grateful for, and flames are prohibited. Haha not really, but I absolutely haste flames. They make me feel crappy.**

**Another thing: I DDO NOT OWN PERCY JACKSON/ THE HEROS OF OLYMPUS/ ANYTHING BUT RYLEE O'CONNOR! There's the disclaimer for the whole story!**

**Ok, I'll be going now!**

**~vampire13eb (Emma-Lee) **


	5. Three Old Ladies Knit The Socks of Death

**At the end of the last chapter, it was Nico speaking, I noticed it didn't say. **

Rylee's POV:

I stopped and leaned against a tree. We were in a deserted garden.

"Look, Ry, I'm sorry for saying all that stuff. I guess I was just stressed from the war, and didn't want to fight anymore. I swear on the river Styx that I didn't mean it, please forgive me. Please, I'm begging," he was rambling.

"Nico," I said, and he shut up and looked at me.

"I hate how you could have said that in the beginning, but I understand. This war is taxing on everyone's nerves. I forgive you, as long as you'll do me one favour," I said gently.

"Anything."

"Don't scare me like that again." He laughed. He was leaning against the same tree as I was, facing me.

"Can you do me a favour?" Nico asked, looking at me fondly. I nodded.

"Close your eyes." He instructed. My eyes fell shut. He wrapped his arms around me and put my face to his neck. I felt us moving extremely fast. We were shadow travelling. He knew I wasn't fond of it, so he held on tightly. He let go and we were in Central Park. We walked, until we found a bench. We sat, and Nico still looked tired.

"Will you be good to get us back? I don't want to have to dag your unconscious body back to Olympus. It'll give me a bad rep," I said, half-joking.

"I'm fine. I just didn't want to do this with all the nymphs around," he said, and started leaning forwards slightly. I realized what he was about to do and my eyes fluttered closed. His lips pressed against mine, and I responded immediately. Ours lips moved in sync, until I broke off. I leaned my forehead against his.

"Wow," I whispered.

"Wow," he agreed.

"Rylee? Will you be my girlfriend?" he asked me, and my heart thudded even faster than it was before.

In response, I kissed him.

We broke off, both a little breathless.

"I'll take that as a yes?" he asked, smiling broadly. I nodded

"I don't think I've ever seen you this happy," I said, smiling happily. He smiled, kissing my temple.

"Hey, can I ask you something?" I asked timidly.

"Of course," Nico replied, getting up and grabbing my hand. We swung our arms as we walked up the sidewalk.

"Can we try to keep this from everyone? Just until these books are over?" I asked, and he nodded.

"I was thinking we should do that too. Y'know, I don't want our fathers killing each other," he said.

"Yeah," I agreed.

"Are you ready to go back?" he asked, and I sighed.

"I guess."

He pulled me into another hug, and I nuzzled his neck. Half-way through our journey, I felt him letting me go.

"Nic, don't let go!" I practically yelled, clutching him tighter. My eyes were squeezed shut. He chuckled in my ear.

"We're here, sunshine," he said. I could practically _hear_ him smirking. I grimaced when I heard the nickname. He'd started calling me that since I'd told him who my dad was. I slowly peeked one eye open. I saw everyone – the gods included – staring at us. I jumped away from him, blushing.

"Nice of you to join us," my dad cleared his throat, glaring at Nico, who gulped discreetly. Nico and I hurried to our seats. I picked the book up.

"Who's reading next?" I asked. Before anyone could answer, I shoved it into Nico's hand. He grumbled, opening it to the correct page.

"**Three Old Ladies Knit The Socks Of Death**," he read.

**I was used to the occasional weird experience, but usually they were over quickly.**

**This twenty-four/seven hallucination was more than I could handle. **

"Of course it was. It'd be too much for anybody," I said. Nico glared at me.

"What?" I demanded.

"You talk too much, sunshine," he stated. I huffed, and mimed zipping my lips, and I handed him the 'key.' He rolled his eyes, and put it in his pocket.

**For the rest of the school year, the entire campus seemed to be playing some kind of trick on me. The students acted as if they were completely and totally convinced that Mrs. Kerr—a perky blond woman whom I'd never seen in my life until she got on our bus at the end of the field trip—had been our pre-algebra teacher since Christmas.**

"It's the mist, my dear friend," Thalia said. (Need I saw sarcastically?)

**Every so often I would spring a Mrs. Dodds reference on somebody, just to see if I could trip them up, but they would stare at me like I was psycho.**

"There's nothing wrong with being psycho. Oops" I said knowingly, before glancing at Nico, who was shaking his head.

"How would you know that?" Annabeth asked.

"What year is it?" I asked the gods.

"2006," they answered.

"2006. Well, in this time, I'm currently locked up in an insane alyssum because I was branded schizo cuz I came home one day screaming that I was being attacked my demons from Hell," I explained.

"Oh." Annabeth said.

**It got so I almost believed them—Mrs. Dodds had never existed.**

**Almost.**

**But Grover couldn't fool me.**

**When I mentioned the name Dodds to him, he would hesitate, and then claim she didn't exist. But I knew he was lying.**

**Something was going on. Something **_**had **_**happened at the museum.**

"_Really_? I had no idea," Hazel said sarcastically.

**I didn't have much time to think about it during the days, but at night, visions of Mrs. Dodds with talons and leathery wings would wake me up in a cold sweat.**

"Wimp," Ares said.

**The freak weather continued, which didn't help my mood. One night, a thunderstorm blew out the windows in my dorm room. A few days later, the biggest tornado ever spotted in the Hudson Valley touched down only fifty miles from Yancy Academy. One of the current events we studied in social studies class was the unusual number of small planes that had gone down in sudden squalls in the Atlantic that year.**

Everyone looked at Zeus and Poseidon.

"Fighting, again?" Demeter sighed.

**I started feeling cranky and irritable most of the time. My grades slipped from Ds to Fs.**

"Seaweed Brain," Annabeth groaned.

**I got into more fights with Nancy Bobofit and her friends. I was sent out into the hallway in almost every class.**

**Finally, when our English teacher, Mr. Nicoll, asked me for the millionth time why I was too lazy to study for spelling tests,** **I snapped. I called him an old sot. I wasn't even sure what it meant, but it sounded good.**

"It means a drunk," Annabeth and I said at the same time; Annabeth looking at Percy.

"How do you know that?" Leo asked.

"My father – not Apollo – is one." I said.

"How can you're father not be Apollo?"

"My mother was already married when I was – Urm, conceived." I explained.

"Bad mental images!" Leo groaned, shaking his head to get rid of the 'bad mental pictures.'

**The headmaster sent my mom a letter the following week, making it official: I would not be invited back next year to Yancy Academy.**

"Poor Percy," I said mockingly. I looked around.

"Shutting up, now." I sighed. It's not my fault I was talkative.

**Fine, I told myself. Just fine.**

**I was homesick.**

**I wanted to be with my mom in our little apartment on the Upper East Side, even if I had to go to public school and put up with my obnoxious stepfather and his stupid poker parties.**

"I hate him," Grover sighed.

**And yet... there were things I'd miss at Yancy. The view** **of the woods outside my dorm window, the Hudson River in the distance, the smell of pine trees. I'd miss Grover, who'd been a good friend,** **even if he was a little strange.**

"Blaa – ha – ha! Thanks Perce," Grover bleated, annoyed.

**I worried how he'd survive next year without me.**

**I'd miss Latin class, too—Mr. Brunner's crazy tournament days and his faith that I could do well.**

"Awww, that's so cute," Aphrodite cooed.

**As exam week got closer, Latin was the only test I studied for.**

"Even cuter!" Aphrodite cooed again.

**I hadn't forgotten what Mr. Brunner had told me about this subject being life-and-death for me. I wasn't sure why, but I'd started to believe him**

"Good. That way you'll make it to camp faster."

**The evening before my final, I got so frustrated I threw the **_**Cambridge Guide to Greek Mythology **_**across my dorm room. Words had started swimming off the page, circling my head, the letters doing one-eighties as if they were riding skateboards. There was no way I was going to remember the difference between Chiron and Charon,** **or Polydictes and Polydeuces. And conjugating those Latin verbs? Forget it**

"It's easy verbally, but written... it's torture," the demigods explained to the gods.

**I paced the room, feeling like ants were crawling around inside my shirt.**

"Not a god feeling," Connor said knowingly.

**I remembered Mr. Brunner's serious expression, his thousand-year-old eyes. **_**I will accept only the best from you, Percy Jackson.**_

**I took a deep breath. I picked up the mythology book.**

**I'd never asked a teacher for help before. **

"Maybe that's why you're failing," Athena suggested dryly.

**Maybe if I talked to Mr. Brunner, he could give me some pointers. At least I could apologize for the big fat F I was about to score on his exam. I didn't want to leave Yancy Academy with him thinking I hadn't tried.**

**I walked downstairs to the faculty offices. Most of them were dark and empty, but Mr. Brunner's door was ajar, light from his window stretching across the hallway floor.**

"I think something's gunna happen," Dad said, foretelling.

**I was three steps from the door handle when I heard voices inside the office. Mr. Brunner asked a question. A voice that was definitely Grover's said,**

_**"...**_ **worried about Percy, sir."**

"I was right." Dad bragged.

**I froze.**

**I'm not usually an eavesdropper,** **but I dare you to try not listening if you hear your best friend talking about you to an adult.**

"Agreed." Travis, Connor, and Leo all said solemnly. I would've agreed too, but I was content being quite.

**I inched closer.**

**"... alone this summer," Grover was saying. "I mean, a Kindly One in the **_**school**_**! Now that we know for sure, and **_**they **_**know too—"**

**"We would only make matters worse by rushing him," Mr. Brunner said. "We need the boy to mature more."**

Thalia snorted. "Yeah. A _lot_ more." Percy scowled.

**"But he may not have time. The summer solstice dead line— **_**"**_

**"Will have to be resolved without him, Grover. Let him enjoy his ignorance while he still can."**

**"Sir, he **_**saw **_**her..."**

**"His imagination," Mr. Brunner insisted. "The Mist over the students and staff will be enough to convince him of that."**

**"Sir, I ... I can't fail in my duties again." Grover's voice was choked with emotion. "You know what that would mean."**

The air grew sombre.

**"You haven't failed, Grover," Mr. Brunner said kindly. "I should have seen her for what she was. Now let's just worry about keeping Percy alive until next fall—"**

"Now that doesn't sound ominous at all," Thalia said sarcastically. I glanced to my right and saw Nico staring at me. I flushed a bit. This didn't go unnoticed by Aphrodite.

**The mythology book dropped out of my hand and hit the floor with a thud.**

"Kelp for brains," Thalia muttered.

**Mr. Brunner went silent.**

**My heart hammering, I picked up the book and backed down the hall.**

**A shadow slid across the lighted glass of Brunner's office door, the shadow of something much taller than my wheelchair-bound teacher, holding something that looked suspiciously like an archer's bow.**

"Bows are the best," I sighed wistfully, getting agreements from Dad, Artemis, Thalia, and Frank. Then I shut up again.

**I opened the nearest door and slipped inside.**

**A few seconds later I heard a slow **_**clop-clop-clop, **_**like muffled wood blocks, then a sound like an animal snuffling right outside my door. A large, dark shape paused in front of the glass, and then moved on.**

"Why is he in full form? Someone could've walked in on him!" Annabeth spazzed.

**A bead of sweat trickled down my neck.**

**Somewhere in the hallway, Mr. Brunner spoke. "Nothing," he murmured. "My nerves haven't been right since the winter solstice."**

"So something did happen at the winter solstice!" Athena exclaimed.

**"Mine neither," Grover said. "But I could have sworn ..."**

**"Go back to the dorm," Mr. Brunner told him. "You've got a long day of exams tomorrow."**

"I hate exams," half of the demigods groaned.

**"Don't remind me."**

**The lights went out in Mr. Brunner's office.**

**I waited in the dark for what seemed like forever.**

**Finally, I slipped out into the hallway and made my way back up to the dorm.**

**Grover was lying on his bed, studying his Latin exam notes like he'd been there all night.**

"Guess that worked," Grover smiled.

**"Hey," he said, bleary-eyed. "You going to be ready for this test?"**

**I didn't answer.**

**"You look awful." He frowned. "Is everything okay?"**

**"Just... tired."**

**I turned so he couldn't read my expression, and started getting ready for bed.**

"Satyrs can read emotions, so that failed miserably," Reyna said smartly. She wasn't speaking much, probably because she was in a room with Greeks.

**I didn't understand what I'd heard downstairs. I wanted to believe I'd imagined the whole thing.**

**But one thing was clear: Grover and Mr. Brunner were talking about me behind my back. They thought I was in some kind of danger.**

"You _were_ in some kind of danger. 2 thirds of the Big Three were trying to do you in!" Hermes said.

**The next afternoon, as I was leaving the three-hour Latin exam,** **my eyes swimming with all the Greek and Roman names I'd misspelled, Mr. Brunner called me back inside.**

**For a moment, I was worried he'd found out about my eavesdropping the night before, but that didn't seem to be the problem.**

**"Percy," he said. "Don't be discouraged about leaving Yancy. It's ... it's for the best."**

"Ouch. That must've stung."

**His tone was kind, but the words still embarrassed me. Even though he was speaking quietly, the other kids finishing the test could hear. Nancy Bobofit smirked at me and made sarcastic little kissing motions with her lips.**

**I mumbled, "Okay, sir."**

**"I mean ..." Mr. Brunner wheeled his chair back and forth, like he wasn't sure what to say. "This isn't the right place for you. It was only a matter of time."**

**My eyes stung.**

"See?"

**Here was my favourite teacher, in front of the class, telling me I couldn't handle it. After saying he believed in me all year, now he was telling me I was destined to get kicked out.**

**"Right," I said, trembling**

"Wimp," Clarisse muttered.

**"No, no," Mr. Brunner said. "Oh, confound it all. What I'm trying to say ... you're not normal, Percy. That's nothing to be—"**

"Wrong choice of words there, Chiron," Travis said.

**"Thanks," I blurted. "Thanks a lot, sir, for reminding me."**

**"Percy—"**

**But I was already gone.**

**On the last day of the term, I shoved my clothes into my suitcase.**

"Temper," Travis clucked.

**The other guys were joking around, talking about their vacation plans. One of them was going on a hiking trip to Switzerland. Another was cruising the Caribbean for a month. They were juvenile delinquents, like me, but they were **_**rich **_**juvenile delinquents. Their daddies were executives, or ambassadors, or celebrities. I was a nobody, from a family of nobodies.**

People looked shocked. "Err, sorry?" Percy asked, looking at Poseidon.

**They asked me what I'd be doing this summer and I told them I was going back to the city.**

**What I didn't tell them was that I'd have to get a summer job walking dogs or selling magazine subscriptions, and spend my free time worrying about where I'd go to school in the fall.**

"Don't worry. Most of us do that too," I said, smiling, before shutting up...again.

**"Oh," one of the guys said. "That's cool."**

**They went back to their conversation as if I'd never existed.**

**The only person I dreaded saying good-bye to was Grover, but as it turned out, I didn't have to. He'd booked a ticket to Manhattan on the same Greyhound as I had,** **so there we were, together again, heading into the city.**

"What a coincidence."

**During the whole bus ride, Grover kept glancing nervously down the aisle, watching the other passengers. It occurred to me that he'd always acted nervous and fidgety when we left Yancy, as if he expected something bad to happen.**

**Before, I'd always assumed he was worried about getting teased. But there was nobody to tease him on the Greyhound.**

**Finally I couldn't stand it anymore.**

**I said, "Looking for Kindly Ones?"**

"You scared me to death when you said that," Grover grumbled.

**Grover nearly jumped out of his seat. "Wha—what do you mean?"**

**I confessed about eavesdropping on him and Mr. Brunner the night before the exam.**

**Grover's eye twitched. "How much **_**did **_**you hear?"**

"Not much... just the whole conversation," Grover bleated.

**"Oh ... not much. What's the summer solstice dead-line?"**

**He winced. "Look, Percy ... I was just worried for you, see? I mean, hallucinating about demon math teachers …"**

"Give it up, goat boy," Thalia said, exasperated.

**"Grover—"**

**"And I was telling Mr. Brunner that maybe you were overstressed or something, because there was no such person as Mrs. Dodds, and ..."**

**"Grover, you're a really, really bad liar."**

"Ain't that the truth?" Thalia asked.

**His ears turned pink.**

**From his shirt pocket, he fished out a grubby business card. "Just take this, okay? In case you need me this summer."**

**The card was in fancy script, which was murder on my dyslexic eyes, but I finally made out something like:**

_**Grover Underwood**_

_**Keeper**_

_**Half-Blood Hill**_

_**Long Island, New York**_

_**(800)**_ _**009-0009**_

"I take it Mr. D does the cards, then?" Travis asked. Grover nodded.

**"What's Half—"**

**"Don't say it aloud!" he yelped. "That's my, um ... summer address."**

**My heart sank. Grover had a summer home. I'd never considered that his family might be as rich as the others at Yancy.**

**"Okay," I said glumly. "So, like, if I want to come visit your mansion."**

**He nodded. "Or...or if you need me."**

**"Why would I need you?"**

"Percy! Apologize!" Annabeth scolded.

"Sorry Grover," Percy said.

**It came out harsher than I meant it to.**

**Grover blushed right down to his Adam's apple. "Look, Percy, the truth is, I—I kind of have to protect you."**

**I stared at him.**

**All year long, I'd gotten in fights, keeping bullies away from him. I'd lost sleep worrying that he'd get beaten up next year without me. And here he was acting like he was the one who defended **_**me.**_

"That's because he does." Connor looked at Percy as if he were stupid.

**"Grover," I said, "What exactly are you protecting me from?"**

**There was a huge grinding noise under our feet. Black smoke poured from the dashboard and the whole bus filled with a smell like rotten eggs.**

"Gross," Rachel, Hazel and Piper muttered.

**The driver cursed and steered the Greyhound over to the side of the highway.**

**After a few minutes clanking around in the engine compartment, the driver announced that we'd all have to get off. Grover and I filed outside with everybody else.**

**We were on a stretch of country road—no place you'd notice if you didn't break down there. On our side of the highway was nothing but maple trees and litter from passing cars. On the other side, across four lanes of asphalt shimmering with afternoon heat, was an old-fashioned fruit stand.**

Grover paled, reminiscing.

**The stuff on sale looked really good: heaping boxes of blood red cherries and apples, walnuts and apricots, jugs of cider in a claw-foot tub full of ice**_**. **_**There were no customers, just three old ladies sitting in rocking chairs in the shade of a maple tree, knitting the biggest pair of socks I'd ever seen.**

Annabeth paled too.

**I mean these socks were the size of sweaters, but they were clearly socks. The lady on the right knitted one of them. The lady on the left knitted the other. The lady in the middle held an enormous basket of electric-blue yarn.**

As did Poseidon.

**All three women looked ancient, with pale faces wrinkled like fruit leather, silver hair tied back in white bandannas, bony arms sticking out of bleached cotton dresses.**

**The weirdest thing was, they seemed to be looking right at me.**

"Di immortals," Athena whispered. "The Fates."

"How are you still a – oh," I said, remembering Luke. Grr, I gotta learn to shut up better!

**I looked over at Grover to say something about this and saw that the blood had drained from his face. His nose was twitching.**

**"Grover?" I said. "Hey, man—"**

**"Tell me they're not looking at you. They are, aren't they?"**

**"Yeah. Weird, huh? You think those socks would fit me?"**

"Not funny, Seaweed Brain." Annabeth chided.

**"Not funny, Percy. Not funny at all."**

"See? Grover agrees with me," Annabeth said smugly.

**The old lady in the middle took out a huge pair of scissors—gold and silver, long-bladed, like shears. I heard Grover catch his breath.**

Everyone here's breath caught as well.

**"We're getting on the bus," he told me. "Come on."**

**"What?" I said. "It's a thousand degrees in there."**

**"Come on!'" He pried open the door and climbed inside, but I stayed back.**

**Across the road, the old ladies were still watching me. The middle one cut the yarn, and I swear I could hear that **_**snip **_**across four lanes of traffic.**

**Her two friends balled up the electric-blue socks, leaving me wondering who they could possibly be for—Sasquatch or Godzilla.**

"You need to learn when it's a good time to joke about things like that,"

"Sorry?" Percy asked.

**At the rear of the bus, the driver wrenched a big chunk of smoking metal out of the engine compartment. The bus shuddered, and the engine roared back to life.**

**The passengers cheered.**

**"Darn right!" yelled the driver. He slapped the bus with his hat. "Everybody back on board!"**

"Yes, get on the bus!" Annabeth urged.

"Annabeth, you already know what's going to happen," Nico stated tactlessly.

"But I wasn't there! What if – what if..." she trailed off, letting him continue.

**Once we got going, I started feeling feverish, as if I'd caught the flu.**

"Not good," Poseidon muttered quietly.

**Grover didn't look much better. He was shivering and his teeth were chattering.**

**"Grover?"**

**"Yeah?"**

**"What are you not telling me?"**

"A lot," Piper said.

**He dabbed his forehead with his shirt sleeve. "Percy, what did you see back at the fruit stand?"**

**"You mean the old ladies? What is it about them, man? They're not like ... Mrs. Dodds, are they?"**

"Not even close. The Fates are much, much worse." Annabeth explained to Percy.

**His expression was hard to read, but I got the feeling that the fruit-stand ladies were something much, much worse than Mrs. Dodds. He said, "Just tell me what you saw."**

**"The middle one took out her scissors, and she cut the yarn."**

People frowned, worried about Percy.

"Ya do know he's right here?" I asked. Damn my incapability to be quiet. Annabeth shot me a look. I gulped.

**He closed his eyes and made a gesture with his fingers that might've been crossing himself, but it wasn't. It was something else, something almost—older.**

**He said, "You saw her snip the cord."**

**"Yeah. So?" But even as I said it, I knew it was a big deal.**

"No shit."

**"This is not happening," Grover mumbled. He started chewing at his thumb. "I don't want this to be like the last time."**

Thalia, Jason, and Zeus winced.

**"What last time?"**

**"Always sixth grade. They never get past sixth."**

**"Grover," I said, because he was really starting to scare me. **

"Scaredy-cat," Clarisse said.

"Clarisse," Annabeth warned.

"Let me have some fun, wise girl. While he doesn't remember anything." Clarisse growled.

"You mean while he doesn't remember humiliating you? Twice?" Annabeth asked oh-so-innocently.

**"What are you talking about?"**

**"Let me walk you home from the bus station. Promise me."**

**This seemed like a strange request to me, but I promised he could.**

"Some help that was," Grover grumbled.

**"Is this like a superstition or something?" I asked.**

**No answer.**

**"Grover—that snipping of the yarn. Does that mean somebody is going to die?"**

"Consequently, yes," was the answer.

**He looked at me mournfully, like he was already picking the kind of flowers I'd like best on my coffin.**

"Poor Grover, had to find the four most powerful demigods of all time," Connor sighed, looking at Percy, Thalia, and Nico.

Nico handed Annabeth the book.

**Sorry if I habve spelling mistakes! If you find any, can you please tell me and I'll fix them. I've lately noticed any edits I do to the documents for this story won't show up online, so if it doesn't look like I changed anything, sorry!**

**ANOTHER CHAPTER DONE! :D:D:D**


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